Baldwin IV. died in 1185. Baldwin V., a child, had been crowned as his successor two years before. This prince was the child of Sibylla by her first husband, the Marquis of Montferrat. Since the death of the marquis she had married Guy of Lusignan. Little King Baldwin died a year later (1186). Sibylla was accused of having poisoned her own child to advance her new husband’s interest. The suspicion was not lessened by her adoption of a disgraceful ruse to gain for Guy the vacant throne. As the daughter of one king of Jerusalem and sister of another, she might have held the sovereignty but for the opposition to Guy, whom she associated with herself in the government. She proposed to the chiefs that she should divorce Guy, saying, “If a divorce takes place between me and my husband, I wish you to make me sure by your oaths that whomsoever I shall make choice of for my husband you will choose for your head and lord.” She then swore that she would award him whom she regarded as the ablest defender of Jerusalem with her hand and crown. This was agreed to. The patriarch solemnly announced her divorce and placed the crown in her hands. Sibylla, to the surprise of all, turned to Guy and, placing the crown upon his head, boldly declared, “I make choice of thee as king and as my lord; for whom God hath joined together let not man put asunder.” The audacity of Sibylla apparently cowed the warriors about her; they acquiesced, and some even applauded the cleverness of her deceit. CHAPTER XXVI. BATTLE OF TIBERIAS—FALL OF JERUSALEM. In the meantime Saladin had gathered into his hand the reins of Egypt and western Asia. In 1185 the Christians of Palestine sent an appeal for aid to all the courts of Europe. The imminence and magnitude of the danger led them to select the most important dignitaries as their messengers: Heraclius, the Patriarch of Jerusalem, together with the Grand Masters of the Hospitallers and Templars. The ambassadors offered the crown of Jerusalem to King Henry II. of England, presenting him with the keys of the Holy Sepulchre and of the tower of David. The appeal of the East was seconded by Pope Lucius, whose letter to Henry shows that Europe dreaded as much as it pretended to despise the new Moslem leader. The letter read: “For Saladin, the most inhuman persecutor, has arisen to such a pitch in his fury that, unless the vehement onset of his wickedness is checked, he may entertain an assured hope that all the Jordan will flow into his mouth, and the land be polluted by his most abominable superstitions, and the country once more be subjected to the accursed dominion of the most nefarious tyrant. By the sorrows thus imminent, we entreat your Mightiness with a palpitating heart,” etc. But neither King Henry’s conscience nor his hope of gaining a brighter crown in heaven was sufficient to lure him from projects nearer home.